Back up and running! Getting a steady 5psi with the new actuator and porting, so I call that a success. I'm also running straight coolant now, no water, in an attempt to remove pressure from the system and keep the new frost plug in. So far it's working too. I cruise a degree or two higher than normal, but it rises about 5 deg higher in city driving. The e-fan has no issues though, and I present the fact that the boiling point of EG coolant is 197*C, and I cruise at 87*C. When I shut the car off, the temp continues to rise and peaked at 109*C...but without an achievable boil-over point, there's absolutely no issue.

I was considering a swap to Evans coolant...but regular 100% prestone is almost as good. It' slightly better at thermal transfer, but requires more volume than Evans to equal water's ability to do the same thing.

To test the zero-pressure thing, I evacuated all the mix out of the system with a shop vac, and went for a long drive. Lots of idling too. When I got home, I went to open the cap...to no explosion at all . I'd say that's a success.

I'm at a standstill. As it is currently, the car isn't much fun to drive. The big 16G has an 8cm hotside, which definitely has it spooling higher than I'd like. Another issue is the AW71L, which I'm growing to hate. The lockup SUCKS. At 80kph, which is where I spend most of my time when cruising, I'm seeing 1900 rpm...so there's ZERO spool. The car is a DOG.

So, either I find an AW71, a 4.10 gear set (3.73 currently), spend on yet another hotside (6cm), swap the 16T back on, or go crazy and use the 13C. Sigh.

I picked up some things that will let me have way more fun, and possibly even hit the drags at least once this summer. An AEM water/meth kit, and some better injectors (Deka 500cc vs. the junkyard 440ccs I am using now). I was planning on installing everything last week...but a slight bout of the lumpy plague has me quarantined until wed. I could go out to the garage, but it's much nicer to just spend time catching up on my sleep and working on the car later.

I'm glad it was so expensive though, since it forced me to examine other options a bit more thoroughly. Straight green Prestone concentrate from Canadian Tire (kinda like Autozone for canada) is working out really well, at least until it starts to get cold out. I may have to retire the car a bit early this year, but -10*C is probably too cold for fun anyway.

As fun as a 4.10 rear end would be, the 3.73 without lockup is good enough for now. Thanks though .

I took the 4.10 out from my open diff on the 740 and installed another 4.10 with a G80 that is modified to stay locked over 25 mph... I have a 3.31 in a box that I have to install because the 4.10 is ridiculous with the Getrag 265. I'm revving at 3500 rpm @ 75 mph! Not very good for fuel economy!

So, a week ago, we were setting out at 5am in the Volvo, on our way to Shediac, NB. Not two minutes later, on a pitch black back road...the V-band holding the rear section of my exhaust on, lets go. Yanked the whole thing out, drove home (loudly), loaded up the Subaru (about 20000km overdue for a timing belt change), and took off.

I may replace the V-band, or I may weld the whole thing solid. Haven't decided yet. The lesson here is: don't cheap out and buy the chinabay v-band clamps.

Deleted the bulb-out relay, but had an issue with my brakelights not working. After taking everything apart, and examining the fuse a million times...I actually go to remove it, and it falls apart in my hand. Problem solved.

I f**king hate ceramic fuses. Someone needs to make a replacement box for these cars that uses the blade-style fuses.

Lets just say I think the OG B21A may not have handled 15psi from a 16G very well...

I'm going to take a peek at it over the weekend. For now, I'm still living down having to call my wife to tow me the half kilometer back to the house. You can see it in the picture, far down on the left. I was that close...and this isn't the first time she's had to tow me home...so she's currently laughing her ass off, lol.

Spent a few minutes on it today, and have good news. It's not dead . The issue was wiring-related, and such that when it happened, it was pretty dramatic. Fixed now, and I've also fixed (aka: de-corroded the plastic PCB) the turn signal issue.

Now I'm going to stay inside, because it's supposed to be 31*C today, but if you add in the 100* humidity, it bumps it up to 40*C. Nothing more miserable than hot water in the air.

Well, after a sub-par performance at the drags today due to a weak-ass ignition system...and dying multiple times on the way home from the strip...it's getting put away for winter work. Not sure what's up, so I'm going to do a compression test before anything else. If it's in good shape still, then I'll be converting to MS2 and rigging up a trigger wheel so I can dump the crappy distributor/coil I'm still using.

...and if it's dead, I have no idea what I'll do. Engines are cheap here.

...and if it's dead, I have no idea what I'll do. Engines are cheap here.

Well from what I know about the B21, they are quite difficult to kill!

With exactly 1 MS2 car under my belt, I know that wiring connections and grounds are everything! So is the heartbeat...... the RPM signal. If any of that is intermittent, you have trouble.

Are you using a Tuner Studio? Is your setup still fuel only? From reading your thread, I recall you had cobbled together an unusual assembly of ignition components. My gut tells me you should investigate/ remediate that first. Wire routing with MS is critical, never run your power cables Anywhere near the "control input", that is all the 0 - 5 VDC inputs to MS.

Have you read and understand all the Bowling & Grippo documents on how to build and tune your system? I found their documents to be excellent, in addition to the fine work within MS Extra. Those guys were couple of OE automotive EE's, smart guys!

Apologies if I stepped on anything, I read your thread a week ago and I'm operating on a half cup of Joe this morning! I love your 4 door, keep at it and you'll have a door slammer!

Well from what I know about the B21, they are quite difficult to kill!

With exactly 1 MS2 car under my belt, I know that wiring connections and grounds are everything! So is the heartbeat...... the RPM signal. If any of that is intermittent, you have trouble.

I hope the Canadian B21A is as tough to kill as the others. It's from 84, so I really don't know if it's got the bigger rods or not. The datalogs show everything is fine, no dropouts of communication, just a complete loss of power. Everything reads correctly, the car just...popopopopops and dies unless I release the throttle to return to idle.

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Are you using a Tuner Studio? Is your setup still fuel only? From reading your thread, I recall you had cobbled together an unusual assembly of ignition components. My gut tells me you should investigate/ remediate that first. Wire routing with MS is critical, never run your power cables Anywhere near the "control input", that is all the 0 - 5 VDC inputs to MS.

I've tossed all my electrical shenanigans and have been running the MS1 in fuel and spark, using volvo components. My biggest problem is that I like to do things that challenge my brain, which sometimes leads me down the longest path from A to B, lol.

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Have you read and understand all the Bowling & Grippo documents on how to build and tune your system? I found their documents to be excellent, in addition to the fine work within MS Extra. Those guys were couple of OE automotive EE's, smart guys!

Lots and lots of times, it's my main vice . This MS1 box is a pre-built model, from Diyautotune, because I know that sometimes I miss things, lol ;).

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Apologies if I stepped on anything, I read your thread a week ago and I'm operating on a half cup of Joe this morning! I love your 4 door, keep at it and you'll have a door slammer!

No toes damaged here. When I troubleshoot, I go right back to the beginning in order to see if I've overlooked anything. Even the most experienced person can make a silly mistake, or assume they know too much. Brainstorming is the best way to solve a problem, thanks for the help and ideas .

Thanks for the compliment, I'm growing more and more in love with this car, even if it is turning out to be slower and more contrary than I'm used to, haha. I'm trying to balance my love of crusing in it with my addiction to turbocharging things beyond financially responsible limits. I may remove the big 16G and go back to the 16T I had on it before, just to make it more fun to drive in the midrange.

The DIYAutotune boxes are reliable, so I doubt that is your issue. I'd always suspect the custom wiring harness first.... but what you describe almost sounds like you've got no fuel. What is the age of your fuel pumps.... one thing MS data logs won't show, unless the AFRs went super lean as she dies.

IMO these cars should be focused to "time to torque"..... a turbo that will spool quick is what you want for a street driven car. NOW if you are trying to build a strip machine out of your 84 then the turbo required is quite different. With something as small as a B21, I think I'd be searching for a 0.48 A/R turbine to get that sucker spooled up quick. I'm in process of a 19t for my DD, and the reason is that they are rumored to spool quite fast...... and keep the boost under 16 PSI so the gas temps exiting the engine stay under 900*C maximum.

Since you put in the AW71, did you use the factory CPS? I know folks like to use the earlier distributors with MS, but Kenny (Linuxman) recommended to me years ago to "go to wasted spark" as soon as possible. I'm sure MS2 can handle that, not sure if MS1 is able? The best ignition timing is crank based, not aux. shaft / cam shaft based IMO. I am using the BOSCH Motorsports coil and Buckhaspark WS, and really like it. I'd try to find a way to migrate to that as soon as possible, and get away from a single coil for all 4 cylinders. Alternately, and EDIS system is supposed to be rock solid... also crank based.

The DIYAutotune boxes are reliable, so I doubt that is your issue. I'd always suspect the custom wiring harness first.... but what you describe almost sounds like you've got no fuel. What is the age of your fuel pumps.... one thing MS data logs won't show, unless the AFRs went super lean as she dies.

Since it was a carbed car, there was no in-tank or under-car pumps, just a mechanical one on the engine. I swapped in an EFI level sender and put an Airtex 255lph pump in it.

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IMO these cars should be focused to "time to torque"..... a turbo that will spool quick is what you want for a street driven car. NOW if you are trying to build a strip machine out of your 84 then the turbo required is quite different. With something as small as a B21, I think I'd be searching for a 0.48 A/R turbine to get that sucker spooled up quick. I'm in process of a 19t for my DD, and the reason is that they are rumored to spool quite fast...... and keep the boost under 16 PSI so the gas temps exiting the engine stay under 900*C maximum.

This was the first time I've been to the track in three years, so I'm definitely just holding on to old habits by using a big turbo with a .63 exhaust AR. I have no reason to go that big, so I definitely think the 16T is going back on, or it's going to get modded into a 19T over the winter. Coupled with the electronic boost controller I have now, the response should be INSANE.

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Since you put in the AW71, did you use the factory CPS? I know folks like to use the earlier distributors with MS, but Kenny (Linuxman) recommended to me years ago to "go to wasted spark" as soon as possible. I'm sure MS2 can handle that, not sure if MS1 is able? The best ignition timing is crank based, not aux. shaft / cam shaft based IMO. I am using the BOSCH Motorsports coil and Buckhaspark WS, and really like it. I'd try to find a way to migrate to that as soon as possible, and get away from a single coil for all 4 cylinders. Alternately, and EDIS system is supposed to be rock solid... also crank based.

Good luck! I'll keep an eye up North to see how you are doing

I used the BW55 flexplate for the swap, which is what my car was originally, so there were no teeth for the CPS. I'd have had to drill the block as well, so I didn't bother. I may look into picking up a B230FT/AW71 from a buddy this weekend, which would give me a spare engine, and a proper flywheel to use for waste spark. It all depends on how motivated I am, because it would be a heck of a job to pull it out (the car is buried in a field). MS1 'could' do waste spark, but I have an MS2 to wire in over the winter, which would remove my current custom harness as well. The MS2 could definitely handle the stock CPS/trigger wheel combo .

The MS2 conversion has started. The crappy harness I made for the MS1 has been removed and sacrificed for it's connectors. The MS2 has been modded for waste spark output, it powers up, reads the sensors, and communicates via bluetooth. Progress is being made .

Finished this tonight, hopefully the bracket for the sensor won't be too hard to make. KLRacing has some nice designs for a bracket that fits behind the power steering bracket, so I might just copy that. Haven't decided yet.